A Thousand Words
by PreciousJax
Summary: I'm not good at descriptions. A Syd POV post-Confession. R/R.


A/N: This started out as the intro to another fic I'm starting, but it seemed to work better on its own. I have no idea if its ever been done, I haven't really read all the stuff on here yet. If it has, I'm sorry, no infringement is intended. Please R/R to let me know if I should keep on writing for the Alias genre. I have another fic idea, its kind of long and in depth, and I'm going to wait for the reaction to this piece before I start writing on that one. While the other piece, as yet untitled, is definitely more S/V, this one isn't really anything but something I wrote in geometry while avoiding review for finals. Ugh, I'm rambling now. I'm rather nervous, this is the first fic I've written outside of the Dark Angel world. Okies, here goes nothing.  
  
A THOUSAND WORDS  
  
By Precious Jax  
  
~*~ They say a picture is worth a thousand words. Memories of happier times frozen forever on a single sheet of paper. A window to the past in a forever-changing world.  
  
Sydney Bristow was quickly learning that those thousand words pictures provided were often liars just as much as the people who told them.  
  
The ornate silver frame didn't exactly blend in among the simple wood and metal. The picture didn't blend either. Dozens of pictures of herself, Danny, Will, and Francie, quick snapshots taken at various parties and sporting events. This one was old, faded with age.  
  
It stood out, as it was meant to. A present from a new friend, a coworker of sorts, and now a connection that they'd never be able to alleviate.  
  
Her mother had killed his father.  
  
To say Sydney had loved her mother would be a mistake. She adored her. The understated beauty, the unshakable calm, the quiet way she'd sing to her daughter as she went to sleep. She'd sat up all night with Sydney when she'd had the measles. She'd kissed her cheek every day before putting her on the bus.  
  
The same hand that Sydney had held as she crossed the street had ended the lives of over twenty CIA operatives fighting against the KGB for the US government.  
  
The facts were clear enough, the truth now undeniable. Her mother was a murderer. She'd used her father for access to the very people she'd then killed.  
  
Sydney Amanda Bristow wasn't a child of two people's love for each other. She was an unfortunate byproduct of one woman's deceit.  
  
It wasn't a big surprise now anymore that her father had always kept her at a distance. Sydney was a splitting image of her woman, the woman who had used him, betrayed him, and betrayed her country. Sydney was nothing more than a constant reminder of a past that he wanted to forget.  
  
It now seemed inappropriate to keep a picture she once held dear in a frame that was a gift from Vaughn. His family, his father's friends, Vaughn himself had suffered because of her mother. He had grieved because of her mother. They'd been left to pick up the pieces and move on because of her mother.  
  
Sydney knew very well what it was like to lose the man she loved. And knowing Vaughn's mother had probably went through that very same thing added a whole new layer of guilt to a back that was already perilously close to breaking.  
  
Her face remained neutral, bordering on expressionless as she picked up the heavy, antique frame. She didn't shed a tear, as she expected she might, as she unscrewed the clasps that held the back in place.  
  
Removing the picture was simple. Still, she knew she had nothing worth putting in its place, so she left it empty, carefully returning it to her dresser.  
  
For the time being, the frame would remain empty. A reminder of a past that would never go away. A hope for a new memory worth taking its place.  
  
Sydney picked up the picture of her once beloved mother, studying the smiling faces. She knew she should want to shred the picture into a million tiny pieces, destroy any reminder of the woman.  
  
She, simply, couldn't do it.  
  
The phone rang, jarring her from her trancelike brooding. "Hello?"  
  
"Joey's Pizza." Sydney sighed. Yes, life moved on. The sins of the parents sometimes fell upon their children, but at least she could do something about it.  
  
"Wrong number." She murmured and dropped the phone back on its cradle.  
  
Before she rose, she opened her top dresser drawer, carefully tucking the picture into the bottom of the drawer, a stolen memory she couldn't bring herself to forget.  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
A/N: Okay, feedback, PLEASE?! I'm begging you here. I'm nervous as hell here, please review. Suggestions, comments, anything will make me happy. You can get me at jaci@fanfiction.net or use that handy, dandy little review thinger at the bottom. Muchas gracias. 


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